Clip from Episode 39: Microsoft’s #1 Inside Sales Corporate Account Manager – Phil Terrill:
A lot of times I would sometimes tell them don’t buy it like I’ve done the research and you know Microsoft people listening are going to go “What?” why would you do that. You know by the end of the day like a great seller doesn’t always sell right. We don’t go in saying hey buy this you need is just the newest and latest and greatest. Sometimes you have to tell the customer no. Let them ponder on why you’re telling them No because it’s unexpected for one like for seller to tell you no. And then to gave you a recommendation as to why you’re telling them no versus you know and then here’s what we should do based on X investment which are very different than buy this, buy now, it’s the newest feature really needed. And you’re going to love it. You’ve never tested it. I promise you you got to love it. You know being overly sales versus being really truly trust oriented which is sometimes you tell the customer no and my business background and in the sense of looking at financials will help me do that.
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- Managing leadership expectations around admin work and sales forecasting
- Having a business conversation based on earnings calls
- Building relationships in inside sales “I humanized everything”
- Learning about business, entrepreneurship and finance to win in sales
- “I’m going to do whatever it takes for my customer to be successful”
- Business acumen and financial acumen are more important than sales skills especially at the c-level
- Building trust and influence by telling a customer “No”
- “#1 comes with a price”
- Getting out of the data and just having conversations to build pipeline
- “I would spend about 4-5 hours a day just talking to customers”
- Effectively introducing yourself to existing customers as their new account manager
- Phil’s toolkit for managing a territory of 168 accounts
- Using gratitude to stay sane “given the stress that sellers have”
- Keeping a clean email inbox
- Staying focused on the results and on selling time
- After a call, when the information is freshest, go document it
- “I had one day every week where I didn’t talk to existing customers” Going after all new customers
- The mentality that it takes to get to #1
- Having a quarterback mentality “I wanted to put in 150% so that way at least I hit quota”
- Leading the team as an individual contributor
- From Top Account Manager to Sales Enablement at Microsoft
- Sales: Do you really want to do this?
- How are you going to differentiate yourself from the millions of other sellers?
- “Think about that territory or book of business as your own business”
- You should enjoy it with a passion or you should do something else because you won’t be successful